Networks

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Wireless Intranet

Dear sir,I want to design an wide intranet over a large area .(maximum distance ia 20 km).I want to select best solution for network design .I have enough IP addresses (a C class).I don't want to waste it !In my plan aI have a central siteand some priferal sites .All of these sites must connected in one intranet for some data transaction and all of them will use internet .Do I have to assign a valid Ip address to any sites or it's better to use private Ip addresses ?This is a big decision and I have to challeng with dozen of people I would be very pleased if you help me .Regard

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Wireless Intranet

First thing: I would build a network with routers, and connect them with a technology available in your area. VPN over the Internet is good, and affordable. Good quality routers include LAN-to-LAN VPN capability, with little effort.

Next, you have a class C which gives you 254 usable addresses. Are less than 254 systems going to be connected to your network?

If you use the Internet as your backbone (i.e., VPN) then you will need to do some address translation at the routers. Use Port Address Translation (PAT), sometimes known as Network Address Translation with "overloading". This will help you conserve your class C.

You will also want to subnet your class C to define the router ports that make up your WAN (VPN, Frame/Relay, ISDN, whatever) connections. Use a subnet mask of 255.255.255.252 which gives you 2 usable addresses (but uses 4 from your class C - you'll understand when you understand subnetting).

And finally, you'll want to reserve a few addresses from your class C to use on the inside of your Internet firewall. You will also do PAT there, and you may want to setup a few "tunnels" through your firewall for specific purposes like handling email, etc.

Wireless Intranet

As for your network design:It sounds like a basic hub and spoke will do for you, for now. Each branch office connects straight back to the main office. You will have to determine if you need to build any resiliency into the network. For example, you might choose to setup VPNs. You still need to connect with an ISP at each of your sites to do this. So you might choose ISDN to call the ISP. But what happens when that ISDN line goes down? This decision depends on your business, and what it needsto do. Talk with your ISP, and/or your PTT to explore options. (You might evene choose to not bother, which is a common selection.)

Wireless Intranet

I just looked at the title of your question and the word "wireless" jumped out.

Question: Why "wireless"?

Comment: The rest of your question makes no more mention of the "need" for wireless, but I do get the impression that you and your organisation are new to networking. WWAN is quite a thing to jump into.

Answer: I recommend approaching your PTT about going wireless. There are a lot of regulatory issues that need to be dealt with, as well as the possibility that wireless WAN servicesmay just not be available in your area. This is an "emerging" technology.

Comment (2): Do you REALLY want to go wireless? Have you read about, and does your organisation accept, the security concerns with wireless?

Wireless Intranet

One wireless approach that should work is the Cisco Aironet family. These (from what I've seen) are bridges, not routers, and at least one model claims a range of up to 40km. Of course these all run on 802.11b, at up to 11Mbps. Hmm, bridged, not routed. Not sure I like that, but perhaps a bit more research...

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